Andrea Canning Previews 'Vendetta'

PREVIEW: Vendetta

Guess What's Back

PREVIEW Dateline Sunday: At Close Range

Guess What's Back

Dateline
February 18, 2015

Remembering Vern Holbrook

Dateline
February 13, 2015

This content comes from Closed Captioning that was broadcast along with this program.

>>sarah
dutra
appeared confused. no little dog to keep her company now. her close friend
elisa
mcnabney confessed to murdering her husband
larry
, and
sarah
just 21 years old at the time, not only helped with the murder, but was actually the
driving force
behind it.

>>what do you think
elisa
's doing right about now?

>>she's telling you about what really happened?

>>are you a cold-blooded killer or are you somebody that got caught up in some stuff and made some mistakes.

>>they confronted her with
elisa
's written confession.

>>basically it says i and
sarahdutra
overloaded
larry
with horse tranquilizers p.

>>i never knew that she carry it out and taking me along with her.

>>explain that to me, then. why is she doing this? make me believe it,
sarah
?

>>she's an evil person, anyone who could kill her husband is evil.

>>sarahdutra
broke down and told detectives her side of the story. and in this version, it was
elisa
, not
sarah
who was the cold-blooded killer. it was
elisa
, she said who dosed
larry
with horse tranquilizer, it was
elisa
who ordered her to bury him in yosemite even before he was dead.

>>3 c3 ella enterrarla en el parque laying on the ground for? you know, why is he not laying in bed. and she said, he's dead and i thought oh, my god. what do you mean he's dead?

>>that was the morning of
september 12th
, after the long and harrowing drive home from the
horse show
in
los angeles
said
sarah
. and through her tears she told detectives how
larry
's body ended up in the refrigerator.

>>we put him in a sheet and -- oh, my god. and she said okay, grab a sheet and now let's carry him downstairs. and i'm like, what are you doing? i have to call the police. no, you're not calling the police, you call the police, you'll be so sorry you did.

>>this was the heart of
sarah
's version. she went along with the whole awful, crazy thing for one reason, she said, she was deathly afraid of
elisa
.

>>oh, god. i didn't want to end up like him.

>>was it possible an innocent
young woman
in the thrall of a
con artist
and killer?
sarahdutra
seemed so frightened, so emotional. yes, thought the detectives.

>>i thought a little bit
over the top
.

>>she was a little
over the top
?

>>yeah.

>>you think i'm lying, i'm not lying.

>>you mean she was acting, putting it on?

>>i believe so.

>>after more than nine hours of questioning,
sarahdutra
was arrested and charged with
larry
's murder. it was a classic
crime story
. two killers, mutual finger pointing. and prosecutors knew they could use each woman's testimony against the other, an easy check mate, that is until
elisa
took herself off the board. on
march 30th
,
13 days
after her arrest, a jailer found her hanging by the neck in her cell, a suicide.

>>a million questions for
elisa
. and now that door has been slammed shut.

>>and now
sarah
left holding the bag. would face murder charges alone.

>>coming up, the prosecutor had to prove that
sarah
was equally responsible for
larry
mcnabney's death. but with
elisa
gone, who's story would the jury believe?

>>when you try only one defendant, it's very easy to, as it was for
sarahdutra
to point the finger at the one who's not there.